WAS I THE ONLY ONE SURPRISED THAT INDIA HAS DRONE SPY PLANES?

When Pakistan shot one down last week, my first thought was "India has those things? I thought we were the only ones who had spy drones." Or something to that effect. Turns out India's source for the remote planes is a bit surprising:

The "Made in Israel' markings on the Indian unmanned reconnaissance drone shot down by Pakistani forces last week is just the tip of a very large iceberg of military cooperation between Tel Aviv and New Delhi, a friendship spurred by Israel's alarm at Pakistan's development of "the Islamic bomb." The spy plane was integrated with a network of six Israeli-supplied early warning stations, using the Green Pine radar system whose main purpose is to detect and monitor Pakistani missile launches. The overall system is known as "Homa" (Hebrew for the wall), and is linked to Israel's "Arrow" anti-missile missile. India is the only country to which Israel has supplied this very high-tech anti-missile system, although Tel Aviv has also agreed in principle to sell the system to its other regional friend, Turkey. So much U.S. technology (and finance) is in the Homa-Arrow system that Washington's formal permission is required for such sales -- and the United States is apparently stalling frantic Indian demands for the latest model, part of the pressure to persuade both India and Pakistan to step back from the brink in Kashmir. The pressure is paying off. India Monday agreed to lift the ban on Pakistani civilian flights over its airspace.

When you have the US, Israel, Turkey and India essentially on the same side in a conflict, the other side should be very worried.

(source: UPI hears)